Ottorino Respighi
Italian Modern tone painter who brought ancient Rome to orchestral life
1879
1936
Italian
Modern
Pines of Rome, Fountains of Rome, Roman Festivals
Early life
Ottorino Respighi was born on 9 July 1879 in Bologna, Italy. He studied violin and composition at the Liceo Musicale di Bologna, graduating in 1899, and subsequently spent time in Saint Petersburg, where he played viola in the opera orchestra and took composition lessons from Rimsky-Korsakov — an experience that profoundly shaped his approach to orchestration. He also studied briefly with Max Bruch in Berlin. After returning to Italy, Respighi pursued a dual career as a performer and composer before being appointed professor of composition at the Accademia di Santa Cecilia in Rome in 1913, eventually becoming its director in 1923.
Career and major works
Respighi is best known for his 'Roman Trilogy' of orchestral tone poems: Fountains of Rome (1916), Pines of Rome (1924), and Roman Festivals (1928). These works are vivid orchestral canvases that depict the sights, sounds, and atmosphere of the Eternal City with dazzling colour and cinematic sweep — Pines of Rome notably includes a gramophone recording of a nightingale in its third movement, one of the earliest uses of recorded sound in an orchestral work. Pines of Rome concludes with the legions of Rome marching along the Appian Way in one of the most spectacular orchestral crescendos in the repertoire. His other significant works include the Ancient Airs and Dances suites (1917, 1923, 1932), elegant orchestral arrangements of Renaissance lute music; The Birds (1928), a suite based on seventeenth- and eighteenth-century pieces imitating birdsong; the Violin Sonata in B minor (1917); and the opera La fiamma (1934).
Musical style and legacy
Respighi's music is characterised by sumptuous orchestral colour, a gift for evocative pictorial writing, and an eclectic style that draws on late Romanticism, Impressionism, Gregorian chant, and Renaissance modality. His orchestration, refined under Rimsky-Korsakov's tutelage, is among the most brilliant of the early twentieth century. Though he was sometimes criticised for his conservative tonal language in an era of increasing radicalism, his tone poems remain concert favourites worldwide. He died in Rome on 18 April 1936.